By DAVE BLOWER JR.
Farm World Editor SPICELAND, Ind. — The severe extremes of a wet spring, dry summer and windy fall challenged the corn hybrids that took part in independent seed testing in Central Indiana in 2008.
The tests conducted by Farmer’s Independent Research of Seed Technologies (F.I.R.S.T.) for five sites in Central Indiana had an early-season average yield of 209.6 bushels per acre for the 45 hybrids that were planted.
The late-season yield was similar at 208.7 bu./acre.
The test plot locations in this region included Danville, Greensburg, Otterbein, Perrysville and Windfall. The results from a sixth test site in Spiceland were not included in the regional summary due to an extremely wet spring.
“There was some water damage to this location as the plot was under water four times,” said F.I.R.S.T. regional manager Rich Schleuning. “The final stand was better than expected despite the rough start. Corn was standing good as there was anthracnose stalk rot.”
He added that he would rate this year’s growing conditions poor – “nine on a scale of 10. Most year’s this region would rate a three.”
The most common challenges included late planting due to heavy spring rain, followed by weeks of dry weather in July and August, then strong winds from Hurricane Ike blowing down stalks in many fields. Still, he said other regions in the Midwest had even worse conditions and results.
“This year was probably one of the toughest years I can remember since doing this,” Schleuning continued. “With the spring, the summer, then the way the fall turned out, which for my area, it actually turned out fairly well.”
Top performing hybrids in this area came from Trisler Seeds, LG Seeds, DeKalb, Great Lakes, Crow’s and Beck’s.
Trisler hybrid T-7N88VT3 finished first in the late-season test with an average of 224.1 bu./acre across the five testing locations.
In the early-season test, Trisler hybrid T-6N52VT3 scored the second-best mark with 220.1 bu./acre.
LG Seeds hybrid LG2444VT3 had the best early-season performance with an average of 221.7 bu./acre. This hybrid won the tests at the Greensburg and Perrysville test sites.
More F.I.R.S.T. results are published on pages 9-11 in this issue of Farm World.
Three different DeKalb hybrids finished second, fourth and fifth in the Central Indiana late-season test. Another DeKalb hybrid finished fifth in the early-season test, winning the test site Otterbein.
Great Lakes had a hybrid earn a third-place finish in the late-season test; Crow’s was third in the early-season test, and Beck’s hybrid EX0842VT3 scored fourth in the early-season trial and won the Danville test plot at 223 bu./acre.
Schleuning explained that many hybrids performed well despite the difficult growing conditions.
“The overall crop year was actually better than a lot of people anticipated,” he said. “As an overall, there were some areas that were average or below average, but that’s just according to what Mother Nature threw at them.”
He added that he would have liked to start planting earlier, but it just wasn’t possible.
“Our early planting dates is a key thing,” Schleuning said. “Planting early wasn’t really an option. I think we did everything that we possibly could do this year with the circumstances that we had.”
A list of all hybrids in this regional test is available online at www.firstseedtests.com |
